mpfirnhaber

Good info as always, thanks :)

I would call that obscenely bad luck. In 120 orders I have never received a non-LEGO part from BL. Are you certain they're not LEGO? Many rare colors come only as test bricks which may or may not say LEGO on the studs. Some just have letters & numbers. There are hundreds of other brands. Some have logos on the studs and some do not. I purposefully collect as many as I can, and have yet to find one that I can't immediately distinguish from LEGO by looking at the color, the plastic, the mold, etc. TYCO is probably the closest in terms of plastic, color, and quality, but they all say TYCO right across the top. Actually no, I have a pile of bricks that I'm 90% sure are TYCO but they're blank, but again, obviously not LEGO. Keep in mind that there have been clone bricks since the start of LEGO in the 1950s. Actually LEGO itself is a clone of a product by Kiddicraft called Self-Locking Building Bricks. So be careful what you wish for :)

Some of us collect other brands too. Me, I collect 2x4 bricks. I have a total of 257 unique 2x4 bricks across 25 different (non-LEGO) brands. That's in addition to 63 colors modern 2x4 Lego bricks, 35 colors of Duplo 2x4s, 28 colors of Modulex, 4 colors of Soft, 3 colors of Jumbo, and 2 colors of Quatro 2x4s... and about 100 different 2x4 Lego test strikes, many in non-production colors :)

They're not particularly rare or valuable. Well some odd colors can fetch a few dollars each, but not really the white ones.

These are known as "waffle" plates, and are the earliest form of plate. They come in plenty of sizes. Late 50s into the 60s.

A photo would help a lot :)

Some animals in non-production colors.

I was wondering when you would jump in and give some insight. Thanks! I have a bunch of white and red Samsonite bricks with extra-tall studs from re-tooled molds. But I had never seen it in a plate before. I'll have to keep my eyes open :) Any thoughts on the two "Round O" variants? I have a feeling both might be exclusive to Samsonite, but I don't have much to back that up beyond comparing bricks. Samsonite bricks in my collectino have either raised studs like the one in my picture, or very sharp-cornered studs. And I've only seen those two Round O logos on bricks with sharp-cornered studs. I've also seen those two Round O logo variants on bricks with the logo orientation turned 90 degrees :) Here are some photos of all the different 2x4 bricks in my collection from each logo category: https://www.flickr.c...57651542830222/

Fantastic! I love the bird guy. Very creative.

I used to collect a little of everything, but recently I've been selling off a lot of my collection and focussing on just a few areas: 1. Classic Space. My goal is to have enough parts to be able to build any Classic Space and Futron set ever released. I'm getting close! 2. Creator. I mostly like the old Designer sets and the animal/dinosaur themed sets, but I'll buy just about any Creator set that strikes my fancy. My only rule is no minifig-scale stuff. 3. 2x4 bricks. My weakness. I like rare/unreleased colors, old slotted bricks from the 50s, and test bricks. 4. Animals. I mostly like the single-piece, solid color molded animals, but I do buy others. 5. Mixels. I love those things :) As far as controlling my spending - it's hard. Especially with 2x4 bricks. When something rare comes up, I have to jump on it, because I might not ever get a chance to buy one again :)

Here is my summary of the 6 stud logos I have seen on 2x4 3001old LEGO bricks (bricks with bottom tubes but no cross-support). Wide logos touch the sides of the studs - narrow logos do not. Straight O means the sides of the O are parallel. Round O means the sides of the O are convex. The Narrow Open O logo is exclusive to Samsonite. I believe the Round O variants might also be exclusive to Samsonite. If you have any data that contradicts any of this, please let me know!

These are old color test bricks from the 60s that I recently added to my collection. They are made of Cellulose Acetate plastic. It's interesting to see these from a time when official LEGO sets contained only clear transparent bricks. In fact I don't think sets have ever contained 2x4 bricks in anything but trans-clear... There are more colors out there, but these are quite rare, this is all I have been able to find so far.

Grab a few Creator sets, they usually offer a good variety of basic pieces in lots of colors, and they typically have a very good price-per-piece ratio.

Those 2x4s are all available on BL, you just have to be willing to pay for them :) I'm close to having all Modulex colors in 2x4, and I'm slowly working on Duplo. Also various clone brands like Mega Bloks and TYCO, which are much more difficult since there is no BL for those brands!

A poorly-lit shot of the shelves above my desk. Top: Mini Cooper, lunch box, coin bank, snack box. Middle: Duplo dino with jungle smurf, plus some bricks: Soft, Quatro, Jumbo, Duplo, System, Modulex. Bottom: Some Chris McVeigh designs and a big head filled with slotted bricks :)

Here are a few of the many rare colors I have in modern 2x4 bricks. Yellowish-Green, Light Aqua, Flat Silver, Trans-Light Blue, Trans-Orange. The trans-light blue and trans-orange are interesting because they don't use the same mold as other modern bricks. Instead of thin side walls and vertical ribs for strength, they have thick side walls, much like older bricks that lack the center cross-support. I assume this is to maintain the transparency effect. The only modern transparent bricks I've seen that have thin walls are also frosted on the interior, presumably to lessen the visibility of the vertical ribs. Here is a nice example of Samsonite's poor quality control. Somehow this mold has the LEGO logo on each stud twice - once vertically and once horizontally. These were put in sets just like any other brick. They're cellulose acetate plastic which explains the shiny, waxy apperance and orangish hue. Lastly, here are some wonderful marbled slotted bricks from the 50s. These were only in my collection for a few weeks before I traded them away for a pile of Kiddicraft bricks (1950s slotted bricks, not LEGO but possibly the inspiration for the first LEGO bricks). I miss them already!

Very nice! Do you actually have the bricks labeled somehow, or is the labeling done in a spreadsheet or similar? I am up to 62 colors in modern 2x4 bricks but right now they're all in individual baggies with the color written on them. I want to make some sort of chart, but I'm afraid if I start pulling them out, I'll never figure out which color is which :)

Nothing! I spent way to much money on BrickLink in February :)

I haven't done stickers but I've cleaned plenty of printed parts with no problem. Also old light-and-sound plates with the metal contacts in the bottom. I dump all the parts I want to treat into a round plastic tub, add a small spoon of Oxi Clean and one bottle of 3% hydrogen peroxide, and leave it outside on my balcony for 24 hours. Be aware that older parts will get a LOT squeakier after treatment, and the clutch strength will increase quite a lot.

No responses yet, but I'll be sure to share if I find anything :) I've been buying a lot of Samsonite bricks, and they're just awful quality. Sloppy CA plastic, lots of inconsistencies with logo orientation. I even have a pile of bricks with double logos oriented in different directions. I'm glad Samsonite doesn't make parts anymore :) I kind of suspected that might have been the trigger for them losing the mold. Now I'm even more glad I bought up one of those bricks and own a piece of that history. I hope more are found some day, they're really wonderful.

Classic Space bits, neatly sorted.

There are four actual zombie heads - three from Monster Hunters and one from CMF series 1. The two most recent Frankenstein heads (CMF and MH) would make good zombies, but they're green instead of gray.

I'm curious where you draw the line. If an animal has multiple parts like a shark or a horse, do you not collect it?

I want one of those micro motors for my old Light & Sound space sets, but they only come in red :(

Not unusual at all. A lot of the animal molds were just used once or twice. Camel, ant, ostrich, cow, elephant, There are a crazy number of Scala/Belville/Friends dogs and cats and horses that only appeared once. Heck, even the dinosaur molds were barely re-used. Now I want a goat.